SAN NARCISO, Calif. (Bennington Vale Evening Transcript) -- On weekday afternoons along Man-of-War Boulevard, people heading home for the evening are often treated to a variety of street performances put on by aspiring artists from San Narciso College. But Monday, glee quickly turned to terror as a young mime suffocated to death before horrified spectators who were helpless to act. The incident took place around 5:30 p.m. in front of McNulty's Creamed Sweets Emporium. The mime, whose name is being withheld by authorities until family members can be notified, began his act with simple magic tricks and aping members of the crowd. Somewhere between being pushed to the edge of a cliff by gale-force winds and clawing his way back on a mystical rope, the mime stumbled into an invisible box. According to witnesses, the young clown struggled valiantly to escape the transparent prison but ran out of air before he could locate the latch.

"I've heard of stunts like this going wrong before, where magicians can't find the trick locks on their boxes," said Martin Kreskich, co-owner of McNulty's ice cream shop. "But this guy looked genuinely scared. You could see it in his face. I don't think he knew the invisible box was sitting there. How could he have? And we'd all like to know who the hell put the damn thing in his path. If you could've seen the expressions on those little kids out there, watching that poor man die an excruciating, pathetic death. He kept trying to scream, but no sound came out. If we'd been better at charades, we may have able to find the door and set him free. I can still see the kohl running down his bulging eyes, turning the white makeup gray as ash."

Police spokesperson Ren Williams explained that frantic citizens were still trying to break into the invisible box by the time units arrived on scene: "It was hard to watch. The despair and the tears and the futile attempts to open the box. The worst part is that we still haven't found a way to penetrate it, so we can't get to his body. We've cordoned off the perimeter, but because the box is completely clear, you can't help but notice his twisted corpse sprawled out on the sidewalk."

Williams also said that based on eyewitness testimony, crime scene investigators believe the box was somehow hermetically sealed.

"Whoever designed it was an amazing engineer," Williams added. "A completely airtight, see-through and inescapable cube. What sadistic genius builds something like that and leaves it out in public?"

SNPD officials would not comment further as the investigation remains ongoing, but detectives have not ruled out foul play.